Function word segmentation

  • Bergmann & Cristia (2016)
  • N papers = 5, N experiments = 17, N participants = 290
  • Recognition of familiarized function words from natural speech using behavioral methods.
  • Curator is Christina Bergmann
  • Search Strategy: "We first generated a list of potentially relevant items to be included in our meta-analysis using the Google Scholar search engine, with the broad search term ‘infant word segmentation’ (following Gehanno, Rollin & Darmoni, 2013). This search was carried out on 27 November 2012 and we inspected the first 1000 results. Fifteen additional items were included based on recommendations and by scanning references of included papers. After removing duplicates, we screened the title and abstract of each remaining item and identified 231 items for full-text inspection using the following inclusion criteria: (1) original data were reported; (2) the stimulus material was continuous natural speech spoken in the participants’ native language; (3) the dependent measure was looking time (LT) at a neutral visual target (i.e. not a possible referent of one set of stimuli); (4) infants were normally developing."
  • Systematic: yes

Höhle, B. & Weissenborn, J. (2003). German‐learning infants’ ability to detect unstressed closed‐class elements in continuous speech. Developmental Science, 6(2), 122-127. DOI: 10.1111/1467-7687.00261

Shi, R., Cutler, A., Werker, J., & Cruickshank, M. (2006). Frequency and form as determinants of functor sensitivity in English-acquiring infants. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 119(6), EL61-EL67. DOI: 10.1121/1.2198947

Shi, R., Marquis, A., & Gauthier, B. (2006). Segmentation and representation of function words in preverbal French-learning infants. In D. Bamman, T. Magnitskaia & C. Zaller (Eds.), Proceedings of the 30th annual Boston University Conference on Language Development. Sommerville, MA, Cascadilla Press, 549-560.

Shi, R. (2007). Infants' recognition of function words in continuous speech. In: Proceedings of the 17th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 1541-1544.

Haryu, E., & Kajikawa, S. (2016). Use of bound morphemes (noun particles) in word segmentation by Japanese-learning infants. Journal of Memory and Language, 88, 18-27.